Will the Democrats be allowed to tell the American people what is essential for them to know at this dangerous moment in American history?
One part of that question — which has been the focus of attention for weeks now — is whether this “trial” will include the presentation of the relevant evidence and testimony.
But another part of that question surfaced late last night, when Chief Justice Roberts admonished both sides to “remember they are addressing the world’s greatest deliberative body.”
(It’s not clear where the Chief Justice has been while the leader of that body has been spending the past year preventing that body from deliberating about anything much at all, like the hundreds of measures passed by the House and sent to the Senate, where the Majority Leader has taken pride in being the “Grim Reaper,” rather than allowing the body he leads to deliberate over the nation’s business. But never mind: let’s indulge that self-description with which the Senate has long liked to describe itself.)
Robert’s scolding was prompted by an exchange between the Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, Jerry Nadler, and attorneys defending President Trump, regarding what kind of trial “the world’s greatest deliberative body” is going to conduct regarding the Articles of Impeachment charging this President with very serious “high crimes and misdemeanors” warranting his removal from office.
Here is the heart of what Rep. Nadler, one of the leaders representing the House, said, initiating the exchange that led to the Chief Justice’s rebuke:
Will you vote to allow all of the relevant evidence to be presented here, or will you betray your pledge to be an impartial juror? Will you bring Ambassador Bolton here? Will you permit us to present you with the entire record of the president’s misconduct, or will you instead choose to be complicit in the president’s so far I’m sad to say I see a lot of senators voting for a cover-up, voting to deny witnesses, an absolutely indefensible vote, obviously a treacherous vote, a vote against an honest consideration of the evidence against the president, a vote against an honest trial, a vote against the United States.
A real trial, we know, has witnesses. We urge you to do your duty, permit a fair trial. All trials have witnesses that’s elementary in American justice. Either you want the truth, and you must permit the witnesses, or you want a shameful cover-up. History will judge, and so will the electorate.
Nadler here states part of the essential truth of the current battle: all or almost all of the Republicans in the Senate are poised to turn what should be a real trial into a sham, a cover-up designed and executed for the purpose of preventing the American people from knowing the truth about the President’s lawless conduct.
Part of the truth that is most essential for the American people to understand at this particular moment, as the two sides are battling over the nature of the trial, is precisely that: i.e. that (all, or almost all, of) the Republicans in the Senate have chosen to make themselves accomplices to Trump’s crimes.
(In particular, accomplices to the crime that is described in Article II of the impeachment charges: “obstructing Congress,” i.e. preventing the impeachment process from unfolding in the way that the Constitution calls for, with full access to appropriate evidence.)
The trial rules the Republicans are pushing through, in other words, make them accomplices in Trump’s long-running attempt to keep the American people from knowing the truth about his criminal conduct.
In the exchange that followed Nadler’s characterizing the Republicans’ complicity in Trump’s cover-up, Nadler also called the White House council Pat Cipolonne a “liar,” so it is not clear whether Nadler’s “cover-up” accusation would have sufficed to arouse the Chief Justice to assert the proper “Senate decorum,” or whether the charge of “liar” (or something else on either side) tipped the scales.
But whether “liar” is an indecorous accusation or not, an essential part of the truth is that Trump’s defense is largely composed of a fabric of lies. And that truth is important for the American people to know. Can that truth not be told?
(The admirable Rep. Adam Schiff, the head of the House Managers, seemed to feel inhibited about stating that truth. As Schiff fact-checked various of the lies being employed by Trump’s lawyers, he studiously avoided saying that the falsehoods were deliberate lies — which they doubtless were, and which he doubtless knew they were — which suggests that Schiff sensed some boundaries circumscribing how much truth can be told, consistent with “Senate decorum,” about the campaign of lies.)
In the exchange that followed, one of Trump’s attorney’s — Jay Sekulow — counter-attacked by declaring, “The Senate is not on trial.”
But in fact, on the issue of how the impeachment trial of the President is going to be conducted, the Senate — or, more particularly, the Republican faction in the Senate — is indeed on trial.
It is not just this lawless President whose guilt the American people need to see, but also the guilt of the Republicans if they persist in violating their sacred oath in order to protect that President by turning the trial into a cover-up.
It is not just this lawless President whose offenses call for him to be removed from office. But also the “Trump Party” that puts their partisan interest ahead of their most solemn obligations that should be driven from power.
The American people need to see this ugly and dangerous moment WHOLE.
When the truth is ugly enough, rules of “decorum” can be antithetical to telling that truth in the appropriately impactful way.
And so Justice Roberts’ admonishment illuminates one additional component of the challenge that the Democrats now face, as they seek to mobilize American public opinion by conveying the essential truths of this moment:
Can the Democrats find a way to tell the American people the truth about Trump, and the truth about his Republican accomplices, in a way that does not backfire on them by transgressing the rules of “decorum” the presiding Chief Justice seems eager to uphold, while at the same time in a way powerful enough to awaken the American people to the dangerous and ugly political reality of this moment?